Between 1976 and 1995 in the Martin Luther hospital in Berlin 313 patients
received an aorto bifemoral bypass. To proof a possible change in the therapy
concept in the observation period, it was partitioned into two sections
(period 1: 1976 to 1985; Period 2: 1986 to 1995). Both in the total patient
collective and in the two individual time areas twice as many men were
concerned such as women. The average age of the patients lay beyond of 60
years. Nikotinabusus, hypertonus, diabetes mellitus and the advanced age
turned out as the most frequent factors of risk. The indication to the
surgical interference followed the four stages after FONTAINE. Over half of
the patients (53,6%) belonged to the FONTAINE stage IIb, during 30.6% (stage
III) and 13,4% (stage IV) were operated with disease pattern progressed
further. The stationary process ran with 250 patients (79,9%) complication-
free, in 63 cases (20,1%) had been complications, in 3 cases the arisen
complications led to an amputation, in 11 cases the patients deceased. All 11
during the stationary stay deceased (early lethality 3.5%) belonged to the
first observation period. In the second observation period the number of aorto
bifemoral bypasses was clearly less than in the first period. This reflects
the new trend in the treatment of arteriosclerosis occlusions in the basin
region, i.e. the break with the open vascular surgical treatment and the turn
to the combined minimally invasive methods.